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Video report from ITV News business and economics editor Joel Hills
the coronavirus the launch of the vaccine is going very well. The government is ready to reach its goal of vaccinating the four groups of people who have accounted for the vast majority of hospitalizations and deaths by Monday, February 15.
Last month, in a private call with business leaders, the prime minister said it was “very important” to meet the mid-February deadline.
In the same call, the foreign minister said that doing so “would give us a huge amount of optionality with respect to future restrictions and hopefully we can hope to open things up at that time.”
But Rishi Sunak’s message today was much more depressing. In fact, he suggested that we may have to live with restrictions for several months, despite the success of the vaccine program.
The chancellor told ITV News that the government will proceed “with caution and care.” He admitted that there was “some evidence of a drop in hospitalizations and cases,” but agreed with his ministerial colleagues that it is “too early” to book a summer vacation.
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‘Too early’ to book summer vacations for now, warns Rishi Sunak
Lockdown is a miserable experience, everyone wants to know when it will end. The government appears to be making a conscious effort to lower expectations. The prime minister will reveal a “roadmap” to return to a more normal life on Monday, February 22.
It is remarkable to think that it has been almost a year since the UK entered the first lockdown. The political decisions that Rishi Sunak made in the initial phase of the crisis have been expensive, but popular and very effective. His most recent decisions have drawn strong criticism.
Last August, 78,000 restaurants served 160 million meals as part of the Chancellor’s Eat Out To Help Out program. During the month, the number of daily infections increased considerably.
Rishi Sunak does not believe that his policy caused an increase in broadcasts. “I don’t think the data really confirms it,” he said, and he has no regrets following him.
“[Eat Out To Help Out] it was about trying to protect and support 2 million people who work in the hotel industry, ”Sunak insisted. I wouldn’t say if he plans to repeat it.
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Chancellor says he has no regrets about Eat Out To Help Out plan
Rishi Sunak is also widely reported to have opposed calls for closings in September and the December circuit breaker, something he does not deny and does not appear to regret.
“I believe that, at all points in this crisis, we have received advice from our scientific and medical advisers,” Sunak said, insisting that SAGE’s advice was more nuanced on the need for closures in the final months of last year.
“[The scientific advice] it was much more balanced than that at the time, and you can read it in the minutes, “said Sunak.
“There is no point being Captain Hindsight on this. We have to use the data available at the moment and I think the important thing to recognize is that the locks are not free. Every time we block the economy, that has an impact on the lives and livelihoods of many people. “
The outbreak and the rapid spread of a second, more infectious strain of the virus, first identified in Kent last September, finally forced the government’s hand. We have been locked up again since January 6th.
According to the latest ONS survey, approximately six million people are currently on leave. The Job Retention Plan has helped prevent mass unemployment, but it will end in April. The companies want the chancellor to expand it, he does not make promises.
“We will establish the next phase of our financial support in our Budget in early March,” he said.
The six million families receiving universal credit will also have to wait to find out if they will be worse off at £ 20 a week after April. Given that many of them are financially vulnerable, I asked the chancellor why he could not clarify now whether the increase in universal credit will be extended.
“The right thing is that we have economic support in the country, in the crisis, during the recovery, at a time when we know what the roadmap is like,” he insisted.
The UK economy contracted 9.9% in 2020, the biggest drop in 300 years. The drop in production was more than double that experienced during the financial crisis.
9.9%
Contraction of the UK economy in 2020
Last week, the Bank of England delivered an optimistic assessment of our prospects for the future. On the contrary, the chancellor looked much more gloomy.
What happens next will depend on the trajectory of the virus, how quickly the government lifts restrictions, and how businesses and households respond when they do. It will also depend on the impact of Brexit.
The economic cost of our exit from the EU single market and its customs union is obvious. Stock trading has moved from London to Amsterdam, seafood companies are facing bankruptcy. Fishermen, supermarkets and shippers say the trade deal’s impact is worse than they expected.
Rishi Sunak told me that the disruption caused by Brexit is in line with what he expected.
“I think there will always be some adjustment,” he said. “We have left the EU, that was always going to mean a change in the way we trade. We have put a lot of support in place to help companies adapt to that change, that will take a little time to adapt, that is happening. If you look at trade flows, for example, between Great Britain and Northern Ireland, about where they were last year. “
